ranish
akd partman
is a stand-alone disk partition editor.
Booted from a floppy or CD
partman provides both command line and dynamic screen modes.
After booting an operating system like DOS to a command line prompt use:
part -p | print partition table. |
part -p -r | print detailed information about all partitions. |
part -d 2 -p | print information about the second hard drive. |
part | without options to start full screen mode. |
part
or a CD like SystemRescueCD,
you will be presented with the dynamic screen.
All changes are in memory and will not be written to the disk until you press [F2]
. or ar prompted to save and you say yes
Ranish Partition Manager Version 2.4.00 February 08,2001
Hard Disk 1 6,173 Mbytes [ 787 cylinders x 255 heads x 63 sectors ]
Using LBA
File Starting Ending Partition
# type Row System Type Cyl Head Sect Cyl Head Sect Size [KB]
0 MBR Master Boot Record 0 0 1 0 0 1 0
1 Pri Unused 0 0 2
2 Pri >Windows FAT-32 0 0 2
3 Pri Unused 0 0 2
4 Pri Unused 0 0 2
5 Pri Unused 0 0 2
6 Pri Unused 0 0 2
7 Pri Unused 0 0 2
B - Boot flag on/off
Enter - Start wizard INS - select file system DEL - clear record
--MBR------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Parition Size| Volume label: Starting:
1 FAT-32 2,852| System id: Drive Num: 0
2 Unused 0| File system: Minimun size:
3 Unused 0| Cluster Size: Partition Size:
4 Unused 0| Fat Size: Maximun size:
==F1 Help ========F2 Save = F3 Undo = F4 Mode = F5 Disk ========= ESC Quit ==== |
arrow keys, [End] , [Home] ,
[PgUp] , [PgDn] ,
and [Tab] move around the table.
| |
[INS] | Set file system type. Displays the list of known partitions . Use first characters of file system name for quick search or press [INS] again to enter hexadecimal code. |
B | toggles Boot flag, i.e active partition (marked with >) |
[DEL] | Clears record in the table |
[F3] | Undo. Rereads all partition information from the disk. |
[F2] | Saves partition table to the disk. (CAUTION: point of no return) If some of the records are invalid a popup will warn you. Press [ESC] and fix all errors before saving. |
[ENTER] | invokes specific functions for each file system. |
[F4] | Change display modes between Cylinder Head Sector ( CHS ) mode andLogical Block Addressing ( LBA ) mode.
|
[F5] | next disk. |
[F1] | additional options: |
V | Verifies partition or unused space for bad (unreadable) sectors. Lists location of the first nine bad sectors and exits.
If you verified entire disk and there are no bad sectors,
use |
F | Formats FAT-16 and FAT-32 partitions. see version 2.44 |
S / L | Save / Load MBR - See version 2.44 |
C | Copy partition to another partition or disk |
D | Duplicate entire disk to another disk |
E | ERASE partition |
A | Install Partition Manager to floppy, A: Boot it without any operating system and go directly into Partition Manager. Otherwise, you could have DOS/Windows installed on a floppy and boot it and load Partition Manager (bypassing OS) only if [Ctrl] key is pressed.
Put Partition Manager on the first NT 4.0 setup floppy. |
X | toggles Primary/Logical |
H | Hide / Unhide - changes file system type for FAT partitions and NTFS. ?? (toggles the x'1000' in the file system type, ex: 0B is FAT-32, 1B is hidded-FAT-32) |
[INS]
[F2]
),
Position the cursor on the MBR
type and press [enter]
Press [space]
to choose the IPL you'd like.
fdisk /mbr
"
To use "Text 25x80" or "GUI" boot menu, create a small (couple of megs) partition for the
"
If an error is detected loading boot sector, i.e. not a bootable partition
Choosing a specific HD/Partion causes boot manager to save your selection to MBR,
changing the defult for subsequent boots.
After installing boot manager's IPL, change boot sequence in BIOS start to boot from hard disk first, NOT the floppy. This prevents accidental booting from an infected floppy.
All other keys will cause boot manager to load OS and let that OS interpret that key.
For example, you can press
and waits.
see part240 for IPL options.
if no command is specified GUI will run
Commands:
Mikhail
Max. of 31 primary partitions
The actual number is 32, but only 31 are usable;
Each row represents one primary partition.
To restore RPM's MBR if it was overwritten by some other
program (e.g.:
Another reason to keep RPM partition in the MBR is that the OSes
know there is a partition existing at that location.
Otherwise the OS might think that it is free space and use it if you create a new partition.
I have no problems installing linux above 8 GB.
It might still be a problem as in the case of FreeBSD.
which can boot from > 8GB,
but when I installed it together with RPM, it cannot boot.
(This was the same case when FreeBSD was activated thru fdisk also).
Regards, Muthu
Mikhail Ranish, P.O.Box 140404, Brooklyn, NY 11214 USA
Send me a postcard of your town (or even better - your college, if you are a student).
Boot Manager
(type 0xF0), located anywhere on the disk. It can be
primary partition or a logical disk inside the extended partition.
The boot manager will be written to this partition.
Options for Compact Boot Manager
when system is reset and compact boot manager was installed it displays:
Booting HD1/3 ...
"
press
[SPACE]
boot manager will stop and wait for your input:
[ESC]
continues
[TAB]
- boot from the next hard drive
"Booting HD1/_
"
[ERROR !]
(If your BIOS has boot sector write protection it will give you warning)
To boot from floppy press A
, at the boot manager's prompt.
[F8]
or [F4]
when booting Windows 95 to have it display its boot menu [F8]
or load previous version of MS-DOS [F4]
).
Default boot choice - this option lets you specify the partition that you want boot manager to boot by default no matter what the user have selected last time.
For example, if your kids play on your computer you may set it to Windows 95, then if you are not home
it will always boot Windows 95, even though last time you chose
to boot from the Linux partition.
Boot Manager's timeout - specifies how much time boot manager
will wait before it gives control to the operating system on the displayed partition.
Text 25x80 boot manager interface
----------------------------------------
| |
| Boot Menu |
| |
| 1 Disk 1 / Windows FAT-32 |
| |
| ESC - Boot .....***************** |
----------------------------------------
0 - run partition manager
1-9 - select another menu choice
Enter - boot highlighted choice
All other keys will be passed to the booting OS.
Check for boot viruses
Check interrupt vectors 00 to 1C (Keyboard, Timer, Disk, ... )
and 4A and 70 (Alarm and Real-Time Clock) for the valid
adddress pointing to BIOS. If any of them point below BIOS
memory to the conventional RAM the IPL will show warning " Virus! _"
This gives you a chance to run an antivirus program from a clean floppy or CD.
(Some old SCSI adapters place their code on top of conventional memory and
point disk interrupt vector to it which is incorrectly detected as a virus. )
FAT file systems
[F4]
)
of the partition for the primary partitions and is 63 for logical
drives. If you want to turn logical drive into a bootable primary
partition among other things you will need to change this value.
[F6]
to install the patch,
then choose OS that you wish to run and press
[F2]
to save changes
The patch was tested with MS-DOS 6.22, PC-DOS 7.00, DR-DOS 7.02
Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98 (Aug98), and Windows NT 4.0 (SP0-5).
Installing NT to partitions above 2G from the beginning of disk.
If you need to install NT 4.0 above 4G then you must either have SP5
or get at least files "NTDETECT.COM" and "NTLDR" from SP5 and update
them on the hard drive after the first reboot.
[Ctrl]
. (This will load alternative NT loader "$LDR$").
Let NT finish the setup procedure and ask you to reboot.
To RESIZE (shrink) FAT partition :
Total space occupied by files in the partition.
Minumum size calculated from the location of the last cluster on the disk
Maximum partition size. Calculated from the size of FAT tables
SCANDISK
or NDD
to check that everything is ok.
(On FAT-32 it will always report incorrect amount of free space, this is normal)
Beta version 2.44 (RPM)
combines Ranish Partition Manager GUI and command line. June 09, 2002
part.exe [disk-no] [/command|/BATCH:file [/QUIET|/VERBOSE] [/DEBUG] [/SURE]]
disk-no
- hard disk number, valid values are 1..8
(note that first cylinder is numbered from zero)
Examples:/Print
- disk and partitions information
xtra
- detailed disk and partitions information
BR
- Write standard Initial Program Loader into MBR
active /ACT /P:partition-no |/PRI[:nth]
delete /DEL /P:partition-no |/PRI[:nth] |/LOG[:nth] |/EXT |/ALL
format /FOR /P:partition-no |/PRI[:nth] |/LOG[:nth] [/V:label]
create /CRE [/PRI |/EXT |/LOG] [/SZ:mb|pcnt%%] [/FOR [/V:label]]
Additional /CREATE
options: /NTFAT16 /FAT16 /FAT32 /NTFS
Note: part /print
print information about the first disk
part /all
print information about all fixed disks
part 2 /extra
print detailed information about disk 2
part /del /ext
delete extended partition and all logical drives
part /cre /pri /sz:4000 /for /NTFAT16
create 4G FAT16 partition
part /for /log:2 /v:BACKUP
format existing second logical drive
part /del /all /nodel:NTFS,82,83
delete all but 0x7, 0x82, 0x83
disk-no
and /sure
from the command line are applied to all batch commandsFrequently Asked Questions
up to 1.99 TiB - UNTESTED binary Gigabyte (GiB) := 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes
the MBR takes one row in Partition Manager.
Leaving one for RPM partition, maximum of 30 primary partitions.
An extended partition can have multiple logical partitions inside in which case each
logical partition normally needs 2 rows
(one for the logical and the other for the extended logical partition).
So it is NOT possible to have 30 primary & 1 extended partition.
You cannot have primary partitions in rows occupied by the extended partition .
fdisk /mbr
) or after a new OS installation
(thereby re-establishing the link to the "lost" RPM partition table).
to get the RPM partition table into a file. part -p -r > rpmpart.txt
Print this file & store it in a safe place where you can find it!
RPM MBR
part.exe
You will now see the partitions which are in the MBR.
You will be in the main menu.[Enter]
.
[F7]
. You will get a message:
"MBR written. Please reboot the system WITHOUT saving".
Yes, you read it correct. Don't use the [F2]
key at all.
Once you reboot the system without saving, you will find all the partition info restored!
Master Boot Record
). Press Enter]
.
Against MBR Executable code:
", select Boot Manager
".
Against Boot interface type:
" select Text 25x80"
. Press [Esc]
.
You will be in the main menu.
[F7]
. [F7]
Yes, you read it correct. Don't use the [F2]
key at all.
Once you reboot the system without saving, you will find all the partition info restored!
"I pressed
or
[F2]
by mistake" "I don't know where my RPM partition was"
You require the paper now. If you have pressed [F2]
, You need to
create entire RPM partition table by entering the data from the paper.
If you don't know the location of RPM partition, get this information
from the paper and follow the steps in c.
fdisk
, the first cylinder is numbered from one!
Solaris 8 can boot from above 8GB, previous solaris versions cannot.